Mumbai: Haier Mobile announced its foray into the designer phones market with the launch of its Icon series of CDMA handsets.

The ‘Sumukha´ phone, launched today, uses ancient iconography for the device. The Color FM phones come with a wallpaper of Ganesha with dedicated ring tones and power up tones pertaining to Ganesha.

“We are amongst the first CDMA handset manufacturers to have launched designer phones. The dedicated design centre based in Delhi allows us to feel the pulse of the market and rapidly convert the insight into great phones, which follows the Haier Mobile maxim of providing state-of-the-art phones, which are value for money for the consumer," Arun Khanna, MD and VC of Haier Telecom India said.

“‘Sumukha´, which is priced at Rs1,899, is aimed at mass markets and will be initially launched in Maharashtra," he said.

To a query whether the phone could face competition from high-end mobiles, Khanna said: “‘Sumukha´ is just the beginning of the journey. We are going to launch a series of phones in the designer series in the near future."

On the company’s future plans, he said: “We have launched four handsets in the GSM market, which will be available from next week."

“The company is also launching a high-end multi-media phone at Rs3,299 soon," he said.